A Cooking Life

Notes on Thanksgiving

I cooked Thanksgiving here again this year, and had some great successes by doing a few things a little differently: I mostly boned the turkey and roasted it flat, fiddled with the creamed onions, and figured out how to bake a custard pie without a soggy bottom crust (and perfected a buttermilk pie while I was at it). I just wanted to write up some notes for posterity.

Dish of My Dreams

Eight years ago on Labor Day I threw what was probably the most significant dinner party of my life. The universe had pointed out the guy I would spend the rest of my life with, but I was at a loss as to how to secure his attention. That night, I hosted a Mexican feast and invited the fellow in question along with a number of friends we happened to have in common. He was about to move into a house a mile up the road from me, and inviting him to dinner seemed like the neighborly thing to do. He stayed after everyone else had left, and we sat and talked long into the night. We've hardly been apart since – we were married 5 months later and live happily in the house a mile up the road.

When I mentioned last week that I'd invited guests for dinner over the weekend, my wise husband suggested that I cook Mexican.

Sweet Corn and Chanterelle Risotto

Mushrooms and corn seem to have a natural culinary affinity. This may help to explain how the fungus that causes hideous tumors (‘smut’) to grow on corn ears came to be considered a delicacy – what the Mexicans call huitlacoche. It's caught on in this country, too; I had my first taste at Francine Bistro in Camden, Maine. Chef Brian Hill had found a local grower with smutty corn, and paired the huitlacoche with sweet corn and crème fraîche in a tender crepe. While the huitlacoche may be monstrously ugly, its flavor is gentle and mushroomy and was well balanced by the flavor of the corn.

I've learned to love them together, corn and fungi. Last fall's sweet corn bisque got a garnish of crispy fried shiitakes. And yesterday's chanterelles just begged for some of this season's kernels.

Country Fâté

Last weekend was our friends' annual Lily Party, which I wrote about in this post last year. I suppose I was still feeling guilty about showing up with naught but a pile of nuts, so I put in a little extra effort this year and made pâté. I used the recipe and instructions for a Country Pâté from Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn's excellent Charcuterie.

The result was nearly impeccable – the flavor was complex and satisfying, but it wasn't quite fatty enough, owing to a dearth of pork shoulder at the market. I used a roast, and supplemented with salt pork (holding back half the salt called for in the recipe to compensate), but failed to meet the requirement for 25 – 30% fat. Even so, all 2 or so pounds of pâté were eaten with gusto and appreciation. I served it on a long platter, sliced just over 1/8" thick, laid on a bed of psychedelic Savoy cabbage from the garden, with thinly sliced baguette, pickled sour cherries, and whole grain mustard. Several celebrants hunted me down to compliment my effort.

I have to say, though, that I found this pâté a little too...pristine? Poised? Finished? The last time I made a country pâté was about 20 years ago, and I used Julia's recipe from The Way to Cook. It was terrific, if a little...I don't know, naughty? More rustic, funky, idiosyncratic (and fatty). I'd made it for a similar sort of affair, and one of the guests happened to be Warren Picower, then Managing Editor of Food & Wine Magazine. He sought me out to let me know just how impressed he was with my pâté.